Systems and methods for managing serial attached small computer system interface (sas) traffic with storage monitoring

ABSTRACT

Systems and methods for managing Serial Attached Small Computer System Interface (SAS) traffic with storage monitoring are described. In some embodiments, an Information Handling System (IHS) may include an embedded controller (EC) and a memory coupled to the EC, the memory having program instructions stored thereon that, upon execution, cause the EC to: designate a first Baseband Management Controller (BMC) as active; designate a second BMC as passive; and receive, from the active BMC, monitoring data relating to one or more of a plurality of storage devices without receiving the monitoring data from the passive BMC.

FIELD

This disclosure relates generally to Information Handling Systems(IHSs), and more specifically, to systems and methods for managingSerial Attached Small Computer System Interface (SAS) traffic withstorage monitoring.

BACKGROUND

As the value and use of information continues to increase, individualsand businesses seek additional ways to process and store information.One option is an information handling system (IHS). An IHS generallyprocesses, compiles, stores, and/or communicates information or data forbusiness, personal, or other purposes. Because technology andinformation handling needs and requirements may vary between differentapplications, IHSs may also vary regarding what information is handled,how the information is handled, how much information is processed,stored, or communicated, and how quickly and efficiently the informationmay be processed, stored, or communicated.

Variations in IHSs allow for IHSs to be general or configured for aspecific user or specific use such as financial transaction processing,airline reservations, enterprise data storage, global communications,etc. IHSs may include a variety of hardware and software components thatmay be configured to process, store, and communicate information and mayinclude one or more computer systems, data storage systems, andnetworking systems.

SUMMARY

Embodiments of systems and methods for managing Serial Attached SmallComputer System Interface (SAS) traffic with storage monitoring aredescribed herein. In an illustrative, non-limiting embodiment, anInformation Handling System (IHS) may include an embedded controller(EC) and a memory coupled to the EC, the memory having programinstructions stored thereon that, upon execution, cause the EC to:designate a first Baseband Management Controller (BMC) as active;designate a second BMC as passive; and receive, from the active BMC,monitoring data relating to one or more of a plurality of storagedevices without receiving the monitoring data from the passive BMC.

In some cases, each of the first and second BMCs is a distinct computesled of a common chassis, and the plurality of storage devices are partof storage sled in the common chassis. Each compute sled is coupled tothe storage sled via a host bus adapter (HBA) in communication with aSerial Attached Small Computer System Interface (SAS) expander. Todesignate the active BMC, the program instructions, upon execution,further cause the EC to select the first BMC over the second BMC for theactive designation using a round-robin method. Additionally oralternatively, the EC may select the first BMC over the second BMC basedupon a comparison between performance indicators of first and secondBMCs.

In some implementations, the storage devices of the storage sled aregrouped into zones, the first BMC is configured to access a first zonecomprising a first storage device and excluding a second storage device,and the second BMC is configured to access the second zone comprising asecond storage device and excluding first storage device. The first BMCmay be concurrently designated as active with respect to the first zoneand as passive with respect to the second zone, the second BMC may beconcurrently designated as active with respect to the second zone and aspassive with respect to the first zone, wherein the designations may beused simultaneously.

The program instructions upon execution, may cause the EC to designatethe second BMC as active upon failure or loss of performance of thefirst BMC. Additionally or alternatively, the EC may designate a thirdBMC as failover, and it may then designate the failover BMC as activeupon failure or loss of performance of the first BMC.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The present invention(s) is/are illustrated by way of example and is/arenot limited by the accompanying figures, in which like referencesindicate similar elements. Elements in the figures are illustrated forsimplicity and clarity, and have not necessarily been drawn to scale.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an example of an Information HandlingSystem (IHS) configured to implement systems and methods according tosome embodiments.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of examples of aspects of a chassis havingcompute and storage blades configured to implement systems and methodsaccording to some embodiments.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart of an example of a method for managing SerialAttached Small Computer System Interface (SAS) traffic with storagemonitoring according to some embodiments.

FIG. 4 show examples of messages exchanged in an implementation of amethod for managing SAS traffic with storage monitoring according tosome embodiments.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Systems and methods for managing Serial Attached Small Computer SystemInterface (SAS) traffic with storage monitoring are described. In someembodiments, a chassis hosting a plurality of Information HandlingSystems (IHSs) may comprise a plurality of compute blades (also referredto as nodes or sleds), storage blades, network blades, and/or a ChassisManagement Module.

Each compute blade may comprise a storage controller, such as, forexample, a Baseband Management Controller (BMC), a SAS storagePeripheral Component Interconnect PCI-e mezzanine card, as well as aHost Bus Adapter (HBA). In some cases, each compute blade may beconfigured to connect to and/or monitor a storage blade over a dual SASInput/Output Module (IOM), and each storage blade may be connected toboth SAS IOMs to provide a redundant path and/or other features.

When a chassis hosts multiple compute and/or storage blades, the HBA oneach blade ordinarily enumerates and monitors every storage deviceconnected to the IOM. A conventional storage monitoring approach is tohave every HBA on every compute blade monitoring all the of storagedevices (e.g., “just-a-bunch-of-disks” or “JBODs”) in the chassis,independently of any other monitoring that may be concurrently performedby other HBAs of other compute blades (e.g., Enclosure ManagementModules or “EMMs,” fans, temperature probes, Power Supply Units (PSUs),and drive thermal monitoring).

As such, the inventors hereof have determined that the conventionalapproach results in increased and/or redundant SAS traffic through theSAS IOM/buses in the chassis, and thus has a negative impact in I/Operformance. In some cases, individual storage devices in the storageblade may be zoned in a such a way that the same drive can be sharedamong multiple HBAs. And, particularly in these situations, thermalpolling of drives shared by multiple HBAs only compound SAS trafficproblems in the chassis.

In contrast, systems and methods described herein may reduce anotherwise exponential increase in redundant traffic in the SAS subsystemthat would result with an increase in the number of compute blades andHBAs in the chassis.

For instance, in a chassis with 2 compute blades and 5 storage blades,as many as 80 drives or more (e.g., 16 drives on each storage blade) maybe shared between both compute blades. Under the aforementionedconventional approach, the BMC of each compute node may poll all 80drives once every 10 seconds (or another configurable time period), forexample. With both BMCs polling, there would be 160 commands issuedevery 10 seconds. Using the systems and methods described herein,however, SAS traffic in this example may be reduced by as much as 50% ormore. It should be noted that the percentage of traffic reductionbecomes even greater the larger the number of compute nodes in thechassis.

In various embodiments, systems and methods described herein may beintegrated with any suitable server cluster architecture, such as likesoftware-defined storage (SDS) or virtual storage area networks (VSANs).These systems and methods may increase SAS I/O performance relatively1:N (where N is number of compute nodes), such that instead N bladesperforming redundant storage monitoring, only a single active computesled will perform the storage monitoring and relay the data to thechassis. Furthermore, a decrease in redundant SAS traffic in the storagesubsystem can directly improve cooling performance in the chassis.

The chassis may periodically check storage health monitoring of BMCs,and proactively designate the potential candidate to facilitate a smoothswitchover to another BMC upon failure of performance degradation of thestorage monitoring process.

For purposes of this disclosure, an IHS may include any instrumentalityor aggregate of instrumentalities operable to compute, calculate,determine, classify, process, transmit, receive, retrieve, originate,switch, store, display, communicate, manifest, detect, record,reproduce, handle, or utilize any form of information, intelligence, ordata for business, scientific, control, or other purposes. For example,an IHS may be a personal computer (e.g., desktop or laptop), tabletcomputer, mobile device (e.g., Personal Digital Assistant (PDA) or smartphone), server (e.g., blade server or rack server), a network storagedevice, or any other suitable device and may vary in size, shape,performance, functionality, and price. An IHS may include Random AccessMemory (RAM), one or more processing resources such as a CentralProcessing Unit (CPU) or hardware or software control logic, Read-OnlyMemory (ROM), and/or other types of nonvolatile memory.

Additional components of an IHS may include one or more disk drives, oneor more network ports for communicating with external devices as well asvarious I/O devices, such as a keyboard, a mouse, touchscreen, and/or avideo display. An IHS may also include one or more buses operable totransmit communications between the various hardware components. Anexample of an IHS is described in more detail below.

FIG. 1 shows an example of an IHS configured to implement systems andmethods described herein. It should be appreciated that although certainembodiments described herein may be discussed in the context of adesktop or server computer, other embodiments may be utilized withvirtually any type of IHS. In this example, the IHS is configured tomanage SAS traffic with storage monitoring.

Particularly, the IHS includes a baseboard or motherboard 100, which isa printed circuit board (PCB) to which components or devices are mountedto by way of a bus or other electrical communication path. For example,Central Processing Unit (CPU) 102 operates in conjunction with a chipset104. CPU 102 is a processor that performs arithmetic and logic necessaryfor the operation of the IHS.

Chipset 104 includes northbridge 106 and southbridge 108. Northbridge106 provides an interface between CPU 102 and the remainder of the IHS.Northbridge 106 also provides an interface to a random access memory(RAM) used as main memory 114 in the IHS and, possibly, to on-boardgraphics adapter 112. Northbridge 106 may also be configured to providenetworking operations through Ethernet adapter 110. Ethernet adapter 110is capable of connecting the IHS to another IHS (e.g., a remotelylocated IHS) via a network. Connections which may be made by networkadapter 110 may include local area network (LAN) or wide area network(WAN) connections. Northbridge 106 is also coupled to southbridge 108.In some embodiments, however, northbridge 106 may be part of CPU 102(and the SCSI HBA described below may connect directly to the CPU).

Southbridge 108 is responsible for controlling many of the input/output(I/O) operations of the IHS. In particular, southbridge 108 may provideone or more universal serial bus (USB) ports 116, sound adapter 124,Ethernet controller 134, and one or more general purpose input/output(GPIO) pins 118. Southbridge 108 may also provide a bus for interfacingperipheral card devices such as BIOS boot system-compliant SCSI host busadapter 130. In some embodiments, the bus may include a peripheralcomponent interconnect (PCI) bus. Southbridge 108 may also providebaseboard management controller (BMC) 132 for use in managing thevarious components of the IHS. Power management circuitry 126 and clockgeneration circuitry 128 may also be utilized during operation ofsouthbridge 108.

Additionally, southbridge 108 is configured to provide one or moreinterfaces for connecting mass storage devices to the IHS. For instance,in an embodiment, southbridge 108 may include a serial advancedtechnology attachment (SATA) adapter for providing one or more serialATA ports 120 and/or an ATA100 adapter for providing one or more ATA100ports 122. Serial ATA ports 120 and ATA100 ports 122 may be, in turn,connected to one or more mass storage devices storing an operatingsystem (OS) and application programs.

An OS may comprise a set of programs that controls operations of the IHSand allocation of resources. An application program is software thatruns on top of the OS and uses computer resources made available throughthe OS to perform application-specific tasks desired by the user.

Mass storage devices connected to southbridge 108 and SCSI host busadapter 130, and their associated computer-readable media providenon-volatile storage for the IHS. Although the description ofcomputer-readable media contained herein refers to a mass storagedevice, such as a hard disk or CD-ROM drive, it should be appreciated aperson of ordinary skill in the art that computer-readable media can beany available media on any memory storage device that can be accessed bythe IHS. Examples of memory storage devices include, but are not limitedto, RAM, ROM, EPROM, EEPROM, flash memory or other solid state memorytechnology, CD-ROM, DVD, or other optical storage, magnetic cassettes,magnetic tape, magnetic disk storage or other magnetic storage devices.

A low pin count (LPC) interface may also be provided by southbridge 108for connecting Super I/O device 138. Super I/O device 138 is responsiblefor providing a number of I/O ports, including a keyboard port, a mouseport, a serial interface, a parallel port, and other types ofinput/output ports.

The LPC interface may connect a computer storage media such as a ROM ora flash memory such as a non-volatile random access memory (NVRAM) forstoring BIOS/firmware 136 that includes BIOS program code containing thebasic routines that help to start up the IHS and to transfer informationbetween elements within the IHS. BIOS/firmware 136 comprises firmwarecompatible with the Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI) Specificationand Framework.

The LPC interface may also be utilized to connect NVRAM 137 to the IHS.NVRAM 137 may be utilized by BIOS/firmware 136 to store configurationdata for the IHS. In other embodiments, configuration data for the IHSmay be stored on the same NVRAM 137 as BIOS/firmware 136.

BMC 132 may include non-volatile memory having program instructionsstored thereon that enable remote management of the IHS. For example,BMC 132 may enable a user to discover, configure, and manage the IHS,setup configuration options, resolve and administer hardware or softwareproblems, etc. Additionally or alternatively, BMC 132 may include one ormore firmware volumes, each volume having one or more firmware filesused by the BIOS' firmware interface to initialize and test componentsof the IHS.

As a non-limiting example of BMC 132, the integrated DELL Remote AccessController (iDRAC) from DELL, INC. is embedded within DELL POWEREDGEservers and provides functionality that helps information technology(IT) administrators deploy, update, monitor, and maintain servers withno need for any additional software to be installed. The iDRAC worksregardless of OS or hypervisor presence from a pre-OS or bare-metalstate, because iDRAC is embedded within the IHS from the factory.

It should be appreciated that, in other embodiments, the IHS maycomprise other types of computing devices, including hand-heldcomputers, embedded computer systems, personal digital assistants, andother types of computing devices. It is also contemplated that the IHSmay not include all of the components shown in FIG. 1, may include othercomponents that are not explicitly shown in FIG. 1, or may utilize adifferent architecture.

In various embodiments, components of IHS of FIG. 1 may be used toimplement aspects of a compute blade, a storage blade, a network blade,and/or a Chassis Management Module in a modular server system orchassis. As such, the IHS of FIG. 1 may be configured to implementvarious systems and methods for managing SAS traffic with storagemonitoring according to some embodiments.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of aspects of chassis 200 comprising one ormore compute blades and storage blades configured to implement systemsand methods described herein. As shown, compute blade 201A includes BMC202A, redundant array of independent disks (RAID) controller 203A, andHBA 204A. A number of other compute sleds 201B-N may be present inchassis 200. Chassis 200 also includes storage sled 206, which comprisesa plurality of storage devices or drives 207A-B (e.g., HDDs, SSDs,optical drives, etc.) and expander modules 208A-B.

Chassis 200 further comprises two or more SAS IOMs 211A-N. In this case,SAS IOM 211A includes SAS expander 212A, connectors 213A, and firmwaremanagement processor 214A; and SAS IOM 211N includes components similarto those of SAS IOM 211A. Each SAS IOM 211A-N may be coupled to externalJBOD 215 via connectors 214.

In this implementation, compute blades 201A-N are each coupled to bothSAS IOMs 211A-N via power distribution board (PDB) 210, which mayinclude a PCB with electrical traces configured to route signals andmessages exchanged among the various components of chassis 200. Althoughthe aforementioned connections are provided via PDB 210 in thisparticular illustration, a person of ordinary skill in the art willimmediately recognize in light of this disclosure that any othersuitable connection device or apparatus may be used to connect thesevarious components, such as cables, wires, midplanes, backplanes,connectors, multiplexers, routing circuitry, or the like.

EC 216 is coupled to FMPs 214A-N, and comprising Compute Node StorageDatabase (CNSDB) 217 and Intelligent Active Selection Module (IASM) 218.For example, EC 216 may be part of a chassis management module or thelike. In various embodiments and in contrast with other systems, EC 216may be in direct communication with compute blades 201A-N, independentlyof other conventional communications enabled by PDB 210.

In operation, EC 216 may employ CNSDB 217 and IASM 218 to implementvarious techniques for managing SAS traffic with storage monitoring. Inthat regard, FIG. 3 is a flowchart of an example of method 300 formanaging SAS traffic with storage monitoring. In some embodiments,method 300 may be performed by IASM 218 of EC 216.

At block 301, method 300 includes collecting chassis inventory alongwith HBA configuration of each compute blade via their respective BMCs.The EC may store the collected compute blade parameters in non-volatilememory, and it may update CNSDB 217 along with blade serial number andcorresponding HBA storage monitoring.

At block 302, method 300 includes identifying or designating each BMC asactive or passive, with respect to storage monitoring. Then, at block303, method 300 enables storage monitoring in an active BMC. At block304, method 300 disables storage monitoring for all passive BMCs. Atblock 305, the active BMC periodically synchronizes all storagemonitoring data with the EC. If the currently active BMC fails, method300 enables monitoring by a previously designated passive BMC.

Again, at block 301, the EC may compare performance indicators ofinventoried BMCs to identify a suitable active BMC. For example, the ECmay compare the processing capabilities of BMCs (e.g., speed, operatingfrequency, model number, number of previous failures, date ofmanufacturing, version, etc.) in different compute sleds, and it mayselect one among the various BMCs that displays the most suitableprocessing capabilities (e.g., the fastest, most recently released, mostreliable, etc.).

In some cases, upon designation by the EC, an active BMC may becomeresponsible for performing all storage monitoring on behalf of all otherBMCs, to the exclusion of those BMC,s which have been designated aspassive. A passive BMC starts monitoring components of the storage sledonly after being designated as active by the EC, for example, upon faultof the currently active BMC. As a result, the EC receives storage devicemonitoring data from the active BMC without receiving that monitoringdata from the passive BMC. The EC may continue to designate a BMC asactive using a round-robin method or the like.

Additionally or alternatively, method 300 may designate at least asecond BMC as a “failover” BMC prior to failure of the currently activeBMC. For example, the EC may be configured to periodically poll allpassive BMCs for their respective health status and/or one or more ofthe aforementioned performance indicators. Additionally oralternatively, the EC may cause one or more of the passive BMCs toperform storage device monitoring at a lower rate (longer timeintervals), and it may compare the readings obtained by those passiveBMCs with the actual storage device monitoring being performed by theactive BMC that is used by the EC to perform chassis managementoperations.

For example, if the active BMC polls all drives once every 10 seconds,the passive BMCs may poll all drives once every 1,000 seconds (that is,10 times fewer commands than if the BMC were active), so as not to havea significant impact in overall SAS traffic while at the same collectingsufficient information to identify a best performing BMC to bedesignated as failover and/or active in case of a later fault of theactive BMC.

In some cases, the failover BMC may be one among the of passive BMCswhose readings (e.g., temperature) are closest to those performed by theactive BMC. The EC may designate one of the passive BMCs as a failoverBMC and, upon detection of a storage monitoring failure or error, thefailover BMC takes over all of the storage monitoring activity from theactive BMC.

Additionally or alternatively, in various implementations, there may besets of drives in the storage blade that are zoned across differentcompute blades, in which case the EC may independently select active andpassive BMCs for each set of zoned drives. For example, storage devicesof the storage sled may be grouped into tw disk zones, a first BMC maybe configured to access a first zone comprising a first storage deviceand excluding a second storage device, a second BMC may be configured toaccess the second zone comprising a second storage device and excludingfirst storage device.

In some cases, the first BMC may be concurrently designated as activewith respect to the first zone and as passive with respect to the secondzone. The second BMC may be concurrently designated as active withrespect to the second zone and as passive with respect to the firstzone. Moreover, these different designations may be used simultaneouslyduring normal operation of the chassis. As such, techniques describedherein may be used with a single set of shared pool of drives and/orwith multiple sets of shared pool of drives.

For sake of illustration, assume that a chassis has 3 compute blades and2 zones of drives across 4 storage blades, such that zone 1 drives areshared across compute blades 1 through 3, and zone 2 drives are sharedbetween compute blades 2 and 3. In this case, the EC may maintain atable or other data structure in CNSDB 217, such as Table I below:

TABLE I Zone 1 Active BMC 1, Only BMC 1 does the monitoring, and drivelist Passive BMC 2, BMCs 2 and 3 are designated by the Passive BMC 3 ECto take over if BMC 1 goes down Zone 2 Active BMC 2, Only BMC 2 does themonitoring, and drive list Passive BMC 3 BMC 3 is designated by the ECto take over if BMC 2 goes down

The BMC designated as active may be a BMC that has the most number ofdrives assigned to its zone. Alternatively, the active BMC may be theBMC that has the fewest number of drives assigned to its zone.

FIG. 4 show examples of messages exchanged in an implementation ofmethod 300. In this case, messages 400 are exchanged among two or moreof EC 216 having CNSDB 217, active BMC 401, passive BMC 402, HBA 204,storage sleds 206A-B, and JBOD 215. At the outset, message(s) 403between HBA 204 and BMCs 402 and 403 establish an i2C/PCIe VDM channelwith storage sleds 206A-B and JOBD 215. Then message(s) 404 are used tomonitor BMC's health indicators. Examples of BMC health indicatorsinclude, but are not limited to: BMC uptime, BMC CPU utilization, BMCRealTime Monitoring Component status (healthy), and so on.

Message(s) 405 then are used to configure, enable, and/or designate BMC401 as active for storage monitoring, and messages 406 are used toconfigure, disable, and/or designate BMC 402 to as passive.

Message(s) 407 are used by active BMC 401 to transmit monitoring data toEC 407. If or when active BMC fails or operates with degradedperformance, message(s) 408 are used to configure, disable, and/ordesignate BMC 402 as active for storage monitoring. Information obtainedvia messages 400 are stored in CNSDB 217 to facilitate operation ofmethod 300 in FIG. implemented using components of system 200.

As such, systems and methods described herein may be used to optimizeSAS traffic in many different cluster architecture or appliances, andleverages storage Inventory/monitoring features which are scalableacross different environments.

It should be understood that various operations described herein may beimplemented in software executed by processing circuitry, hardware, or acombination thereof. The order in which each operation of a given methodis performed may be changed, and various operations may be added,reordered, combined, omitted, modified, etc. It is intended that theinvention(s) described herein embrace all such modifications and changesand, accordingly, the above description should be regarded in anillustrative rather than a restrictive sense.

The terms “tangible” and “non-transitory,” when used herein, areintended to describe a computer-readable storage medium (or “memory”)excluding propagating electromagnetic signals; but are not intended tootherwise limit the type of physical computer-readable storage devicethat is encompassed by the phrase computer-readable medium or memory.For instance, the terms “non-transitory computer readable medium” or“tangible memory” are intended to encompass types of storage devicesthat do not necessarily store information permanently, including, forexample, RAM. Program instructions and data stored on a tangiblecomputer-accessible storage medium in non-transitory form may afterwardsbe transmitted by transmission media or signals such as electrical,electromagnetic, or digital signals, which may be conveyed via acommunication medium such as a network and/or a wireless link.

Although the invention(s) is/are described herein with reference tospecific embodiments, various modifications and changes can be madewithout departing from the scope of the present invention(s), as setforth in the claims below. Accordingly, the specification and figuresare to be regarded in an illustrative rather than a restrictive sense,and all such modifications are intended to be included within the scopeof the present invention(s). Any benefits, advantages, or solutions toproblems that are described herein with regard to specific embodimentsare not intended to be construed as a critical, required, or essentialfeature or element of any or all the claims.

Unless stated otherwise, terms such as “first” and “second” are used toarbitrarily distinguish between the elements such terms describe. Thus,these terms are not necessarily intended to indicate temporal or otherprioritization of such elements. The terms “coupled” or “operablycoupled” are defined as connected, although not necessarily directly,and not necessarily mechanically. The terms “a” and “an” are defined asone or more unless stated otherwise.

The terms “comprise” (and any form of comprise, such as “comprises” and“comprising”), “have” (and any form of have, such as “has” and“having”), “include” (and any form of include, such as “includes” and“including”) and “contain” (and any form of contain, such as “contains”and “containing”) are open-ended linking verbs. As a result, a system,device, or apparatus that “comprises,” “has,” “includes” or “contains”one or more elements possesses those one or more elements but is notlimited to possessing only those one or more elements. Similarly, amethod or process that “comprises,” “has,” “includes” or “contains” oneor more operations possesses those one or more operations but is notlimited to possessing only those one or more operations.

1. An Information Handling System (IHS), comprising: an embeddedcontroller (EC); and a memory coupled to the EC, the memory havingprogram instructions stored thereon that, upon execution, cause the ECto: designate a first Baseband Management Controller (BMC) as active;designate a second BMC as passive; and receive, from the active BMC,monitoring data relating to one or more of a plurality of storagedevices without receiving the monitoring data from the passive BMC. 2.The IHS of claim 1, wherein each of the first and second BMCs is adistinct compute sled of a common chassis, and wherein the plurality ofstorage devices are part of storage sled in the common chassis.
 3. TheIHS of claim 2, wherein each compute sled is coupled to the storage sledvia a host bus adapter (HBA) in communication with a Serial AttachedSmall Computer System Interface (SAS) expander.
 4. The IHS of claim 1,wherein to designate the active BMC, the program instructions, uponexecution, further cause the EC to select the first BMC over the secondBMC for the active designation using a round-robin method.
 5. The IHS ofclaim 1, wherein to designate the active BMC, the program instructions,upon execution, further cause the EC to select the first BMC over thesecond BMC based upon a comparison between performance indicators offirst and second BMCs.
 6. The IHS of claim 1, wherein storage devices ofthe storage sled are grouped into zones, wherein the first BMC isconfigured to access a first zone comprising a first storage device andexcluding a second storage device, and wherein the second BMC isconfigured to access the second zone comprising a second storage deviceand excluding first storage device.
 7. The IHS of claim 6, wherein thefirst BMC is concurrently designated as active with respect to the firstzone and as passive with respect to the second zone, wherein the secondBMC is concurrently designated as active with respect to the second zoneand as passive with respect to the first zone, and wherein thedesignations are used simultaneously.
 8. The IHS of claim 7, wherein theprogram instructions upon execution, further cause the EC to designatethe second BMC as active upon failure or loss of performance of thefirst BMC.
 9. The IHS of claim 1, wherein the program instructions uponexecution, further cause the EC to: designate a third BMC as failover;and designate the failover BMC as active upon failure or loss ofperformance of the first BMC.
 10. An embedded controller (EC) havingprogram instructions stored thereon that, upon execution by anInformation Handling System (IHS), cause the IHS to: designate a firstBaseband Management Controller (BMC) as active; designate a second BMCas passive; and receive, from the active BMC, monitoring data relatingto one or more of a plurality of storage devices without receiving themonitoring data from the passive BMC.
 11. The EC of claim 10, whereineach of the first and second BMCs is a distinct compute sled of a commonchassis, wherein the plurality of storage devices are part of storagesled in the common chassis, wherein each compute sled is coupled to thestorage sled via a host bus adapter (HBA) in communication with a SerialAttached Small Computer System Interface (SAS) expander.
 12. The EC ofclaim 10, wherein to designate the active BMC, the program instructions,upon execution, further cause the EC to select the first BMC over thesecond BMC based upon a comparison between performance indicators offirst and second BMCs.
 13. The EC of claim 10, wherein storage devicesof the storage sled are grouped into zones, wherein the first BMC isconfigured to access a first zone comprising a first storage device andexcluding a second storage device, and wherein the second BMC isconfigured to access the second zone comprising a second storage deviceand excluding first storage device.
 14. The EC of claim 13, wherein thefirst BMC is concurrently designated as active with respect to the firstzone and as passive with respect to the second zone, wherein the secondBMC is concurrently designated as active with respect to the second zoneand as passive with respect to the first zone, and wherein thedesignations are used simultaneously.
 15. The EC of claim 14, whereinthe program instructions upon execution, further cause the EC todesignate the second BMC as active upon failure or loss of performanceof the first BMC.
 16. The EC of claim 10, wherein the programinstructions upon execution, further cause the EC to: designate a thirdBMC as failover; and designate the failover BMC as active upon failureor loss of performance of the first BMC.
 17. A method, comprising:designating a first Baseband Management Controller (BMC) as active;designating a second BMC as passive; and receiving, from the active BMC,monitoring data relating to one or more of a plurality of storagedevices without receiving the monitoring data from the passive BMC. 18.The method of claim 17, wherein each of the first and second BMCs is adistinct compute sled of a common chassis, wherein the plurality ofstorage devices are part of storage sled in the common chassis, whereineach compute sled is coupled to the storage sled via a host bus adapter(HBA) in communication with a Serial Attached Small Computer SystemInterface (SAS) expander.
 19. The method of claim 17, wherein storagedevices of the storage sled are grouped into zones, wherein the firstBMC is configured to access a first zone comprising a first storagedevice and excluding a second storage device, and wherein the second BMCis configured to access the second zone comprising a second storagedevice and excluding first storage device.
 20. The method of claim 19,wherein the first BMC is concurrently designated as active with respectto the first zone and as passive with respect to the second zone,wherein the second BMC is concurrently designated as active with respectto the second zone and as passive with respect to the first zone, andwherein the designations are used simultaneously.